The Oscars never fail to disappoint. No matter if one believes the choice of winners are the right ones and their awards are well-deserved or there was someone else who actually took the spotlight but was robbed of an Oscar, the Academy Awards ceremony provides enjoyment, entertainment, as well as outfits and moments worth all the attention they get.
Among Ryan Gosling’s iconic I’m Just Ken performance, Robert Downey Jr’s first ever Oscar win and Al Pacino failing to read the nominees before announcing the winner, there was yet another moment that people can’t stop talking about. As you are guessing already, that’s John Cena’s skit that required him taking the stage completely naked.
Cena was to announce the winner for the category of Best Costume Design, for which the films Poor Things, Oppenheimer, Barbie, Napoleon, and Killers of the Flower Moon were racing.
The host, Jimmie Kimmel, recalling an incident where a streaker ran across the stage at the 1974 Academy Awards, asked: “Can you imagine if a nude man ran across the stage today? Wouldn’t that be crazy?”
At that moment, Cena peeked around the curtain saying, “I changed my mind. I don’t want to do the streaker bit. I just don’t feel right about it. It’s an elegant event, you know, you should feel shame right now for suggesting such a tasteless joke.”
“The male body is not a joke!” the WWE star added.
To the surprise, and obviously the delight of many, Cena walked into the stage covering his modesty only with the envelope containing the winning nomination.
Shortly following the skit, a social media post revealed that Cena was in fact wearing skin-painted underwear behind the envelope.
“He’s actually wearing skin-painted underwear,” one X user wrote. “Great job by the makeup department.”
“That’s disappointing! I say go all in! Or all out!” another added. “He probably wanted to but was told they couldn’t.
“This guy is getting out of hand,” a third wrote.
Needless to say, Cena’s ‘naked’ appearance caused quite the stir at the Dolby Theater, where the 96th Academy Awards was held, and a fair amount of people online had things to say about it to.
Though Cena himself wasn’t nominated for an Oscar this year, he did have a small part to play in the popular 2023 flick Barbie.
Interestingly, the 46-year-old recently revealed how he had been advised not to take a role in the movie prior to its wildly-successful release.
“The agency is just going on what they know,” Cena said on the Howard Stern Show a few weeks ago.”
“And what they know is: This entity, this commodity gravitates toward these things, we should stay in this lane.
“But I’m not a commodity. I’m a human being, and I operate under the construct of every opportunity is an opportunity,” he went on. “I think the perspective from an agency standpoint was: This is beneath you.”
“But also to the agency’s credit, immediately they acquiesced, and I was like: No we’re going to do it.”
